Age 13, Halloween Night

I was 13 years old and it was Halloween evening. My mom had gone to another town an hour away to have my grandma (her mom) and grandpa help her buy a car. She needed a new one because the car she had before was taken from the parking lot at her work by her asshole X-husband (my baby brother's dad) so she now had no transportation. She took my little brother (then age 2) with her and I was supposed to make myself some dinner and go trick-or-treating with my friends.

I decided on a hamburger and fries. The hamburgers were left over from the night before and the potatoes were already sliced and soaking in a pan of water in the fridge. I grabbed a pan, filled it half way with oil and turned the burner on to heat it up. I grabbed a handful of fries out of the water, dropped them in the cold oil and then headed down into the basement, where my room was, to throw on my costume. You can pretty much imagine what happened next. Yeah, I know now that oil and watery potato slices don't mix very well but I was just a kid. I came back upstairs to find the stove on fire and the kitchen cabinets engulfed in raging flames clear to the ceiling.

We didn't have a phone at the time so I couldn't call 911 and I didn't know what to do. My mom's temper was a force to be reckoned with and I feared her much more than the fire so I grabbed a towel from the laundry room and ducked down beside the stove to beat at the flames. It became very clear after I singed half my hair off that the fire was completely out of control so I ran to the neighbors and frantically told the girl (who I went to school with) that our house was on fire and she needed to call 911 for me. She didn't believe me until I made her step out onto her porch where she could see the black smoke billowing into the sky.

While she made the call, I ran back to the house. The whole kitchen was consumed by now and flames were coming out of the back door to the house. I ran down into the basement and got the hose, hooked it up to the outside of the house and started spraying it inside the door and into the kitchen. The next thing I remember is waking up on the front yard with a firefighter leaning over me and an oxygen mask on my face. I turned my head to look up at the house just in time to watch my mom's bedroom window explode. The fireman asked me if my mom had a waterbed and, when I said yes, he replied "not any more". He asked if there was anyone else in the house and when he was sure that I was clear on that, left me on the lawn by myself to be stared at by the trick-or-treaters passing by.

There was no way to get a hold of my mom so all I could do was wait. The neighbor girl's mom was kind enough to let me wait there so that's where I went. It just so happened that the girl was having a Halloween dance party that night so while my school mates partied in the garage, I watched the clock from a sleeping bag on her bedroom floor.

Our neighbors across the street came and got me when my mom got home. They had been watching for her to get home and she was now sitting at their kitchen table talking to my grandparents on the phone and telling them what had happened. She came home with a new car and now had no home. When I walked into the kitchen, she stopped just long enough to tell me that I had ruined everything she had worked for in the last 13 years, she hated me and couldn't stand to look at me. I went in the living room and waited for grandma to get there. I figured the further away I was, the safer I would be.

Before you feel too sorry for me, I will tell you this. My mom may not have loved me enough to conquer her rage but I am my grandma's favorite. She would tell you this herself. She ran to me crying her thank yous to God that I was OK and hugged me so long and so hard that I had an imprint on the side of my face for 3 days from her glasses. No joke.

We lived with my grandma for the next month or two. It's a good thing we did because she saved my life in those first few weeks several times. We would all be sitting quietly watching TV and Mom would leap off the couch with no warning and dive for my throat. My grandma, who is all of about 5'3" and 120 lbs, would get in front of me and stop her daughter in her tracks with her finger in her face and a stern "you will NOT lay a hand on that child". I could see cold, black hatred in my mom's eyes but she would go back and take her seat.

In her defense, she had just gone through a nasty divorce, was working full time for the state as an AFS caseworker (not a fun job), raising a 13 and 2 year old by herself with no child support, had lost her car and just managed to get another one, had no renter's insurance so she was being sued by the home owner's insurance company for the value of the house (which was totally destroyed) and had lost all of her belongings. To add insult to injury, the only thing that survived the fire was my bedroom furniture because my room was in the basement.

I still feel bad for what I did. I know it was an accident but it was still my fault. I remember that by Christmas we were finally moved into our new home. Sitting on the couch that the church had donated to us, my baby brother and I opened our 2 gifts. Someone had put us on a giving tree of some sort and we each got a stuffed animal and a tree ornament. I still have them, a blue bunny and a rocking chair. There's a Polaroid picture of it somewhere. My mom watched us open them up and then went to take a nap. I listened to her crying from down the hall.

I'm sorry for being such a bummer and telling such a sad story but I had nothing else to post and something made me think of the house fire tonight.

I still think it's weird that it happened on Halloween night when I was 13, although October in general has been an unlucky month for me. Why you ask? Well..............not all in the same year of course, but in various October months, I burned my house down, split up with the love of my life, had a miscarriage and got in a major car accident that injured me very badly (a story I will tell someday). Those are just the major one that I was able to think of right now. I'm sure there's more. I pretty much try to lay low when October rolls around and sometimes make it through it without incident. You can bet I'm looking out for stuff, though. If that's being superstitious, I don't give a shit.